Conventional rotary abrading tools typically make use of a grindstone of ceramic, diamond, rubber or other abrasive of a suitable shape attached to a rotary shank, and the tip and other portions of the grindstone are used to grind, lap, polish or burnish surfaces as the tool is rotated by the shank and urged against the surfaces.
Such tools are customarily used for finishing machined surfaces or products and are also common in dental fields.
In other known finishing tools, the abrading member is a brush consisting of a multitude of densely packed bristles or wires which are mounted on a rotary hub or shaft so that their individual flexible tip portions are successively or continuously engageable with a surface to be treated to sweep over this surface as the hub or shaft supporting the brush is rotated.
These conventional abrading tools are unsatisfactory in material removal and low in operating efficiency. Additionally, they are found to be not readily applicable to diverse abradable sufaces or finishable sizes and configurations.
In the following description, reference to "abrading" will be understood to mean, generally, any surface treatment involving change in texture, usually with removal of small amounts of material. In particular it means any operation which involves grinding, lapping, polishing or burnishing or any combination of these operations.